My GF's son just got out of Jail from some drug charges and a Robbery charge here in CA after 14 Months incarceration. He now has 3 FTA's and a misdemeanor drug charge back in Ohio that are 6-10 years old. When he tried to contact the courts associated with these charges (one FTA was while he was incarcerated in CA) about clearing these charges he was informed that in order to settle these charges he had to first post Bond for each charge individually and then he could see the judge and ask for the fines to be reduced or dismissed. the Bond fee's they want amount to about $2500 spread across the 4 charges in four separate courts in Ohio.

He wants to do the right thing and clear his record, however the costs of $2500 travel to Ohio from CA is prohibitively expensive for someone just out of jail, and on parole for the next 8 months. Just getting a permit to travel out of state takes a lot of work with the parole system and Just getting a job to pay his halfway house housing is tough.

I suspect most of the 4 charges will be dropped or severely reduced as he would voluntarily appear in court to resolve them. But i am just speculating there given the age of the charges and what they were for.

Questions:
1.) Is there a way to handle this issue by Mail/email/electronically for away or will personal appearance be required in Ohio?

2.) when her was detained in CA on charges all jurisdictions were contacted and all 4 declined to extradite. Does this make any difference in the charges since they had there chance and declined.?

3.) how long will these charges remain in the system?

4.) Will out of state charges from Ohio preclude him from getting a drivers licenses in CA and/or a passport ( we have worked out a long term job for him, (merchant marine job) and his parole officer has blessed the job with employer reporting) but he has to obtain a passport and a drivers license.

I tried to figure these out looking at OH and CA codes and its certainly not clear and any advise is appreciated.

SW